Department for Transport

Railway Stations: Accidents

Lord Lucas: To ask Her Majesty’s Government how many train-platform interface injuries were recorded in the latest year for which figures are available; how many of those were on driver-only operated trains; and what each figure represents as a proportion of relevant passenger journeys.

Lord Ahmad of Wimbledon: During 2015/16 there were 5 fatalities, 52 major injuries and 1,388 minor injuries recorded on the national rail network in passenger incidents at the platform/train interface; information is not recorded on which of these may have involved trains which were driver-only operated or which had a driver and a guard. These represent, respectively, around one fatality in every 350 million journeys, one major injury in every 30 million journeys, and one minor injury in every 1 million journeys.

Railways: Greater London

Lord Berkeley: To ask Her Majesty’s Government why they rejected the application by Transport for London to manage inner suburban rail services south of the Thames; and what evidence they have to support that decision.

Lord Ahmad of Wimbledon: The Mayor of London presented a business case for the devolution of suburban London services on the South Eastern franchise. This was scrutinised by Departmental officials, analysing the costs and benefits of the proposal including the impact on the South Eastern franchise and the forthcoming competition. Our analysis highlighted a number of uncertainties in the business case particularly around the operational risks associated with splitting the franchise, and around the benefits that were being claimed.

Blue Badge Scheme

The Marquess of Lothian: To ask Her Majesty’s Government what action they are taking to prevent the abuse of the blue badge scheme for disabled drivers.

Lord Ahmad of Wimbledon: Local authorities are responsible for enforcing the scheme but the Department for Transport has taken a number of steps to assist them: making it easier to withdraw a badge for reasons of misuse; providing local authorities with powers to seize badges on-street; introducing fraud resistant badges; and establishing a single national database of all badges that can be accessed by on-street enforcement officers to identify genuine badge holders. The Department shares examples of best practice amongst local authorities and is currently hosting a series of regional workshops aimed at making authorities aware of the powers they have to address abuse.

Foreign and Commonwealth Office

North Korea: South Korea

Lord Alton of Liverpool: To ask Her Majesty’s Government what actions they will take following Kim Jong Un’s statement that the Democratic People's Republic of Korea (DPRK) must "wipe out South Korea"; what assurances they have given to the Republic of Korea; and what impact this will have on the UK's foreign policy and engagement with the DPRK.

Baroness Anelay of St Johns: The Republic of Korea is one of the UK's closest partners in Asia and we are committed to its safety and security. We urge the government of the Democratic People's Republic of Korea to end its threatening and aggressive rhetoric and halt its nuclear and ballistic missile programme.

North Korea: Diplomatic Immunity

Lord Alton of Liverpool: To ask Her Majesty’s Government what discussions they have had with the government of Germany concerning reports that that government has stopped applying diplomatic immunity to North Korean diplomats.

Baroness Anelay of St Johns: We hold regular discussions with the German Government and other EU partners on policy towards the Democratic People's Republic of Korea. The application of diplomatic immunity to North Korean diplomats in Germany is a matter for the German authorities.

Department for International Development

Developing Countries: Sustainable Development

Baroness Tonge: To ask Her Majesty’s Government when they will conduct the voluntary national review relating to the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development.

Lord Bates: The Government is considering the best timing for putting itself forward for a voluntary national review at the UN High Level Political Forum. We welcome this year’s reviews which provided an opportunity to learn from other countries’ approaches to delivering the Global Goals for Sustainable Development.

Developing Countries: Sustainable Development

Baroness Tonge: To ask Her Majesty’s Government what processes they will use in developing the national reports relating to the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development.

Lord Bates: The Sustainable Development Goals have been integrated into relevant Departments’ Single Departmental Plans. Departments will report against progress towards the Goals through their Annual Reports and Accounts.

Department for Education

Schools: Radicalism

Lord Carlile of Berriew: To ask Her Majesty’s Government whether they intend to take legal action to prevent the identification to litigants before the National College for Teaching and Leadership disciplinary tribunals of the whistleblowers in the Birmingham "Trojan Horse" investigation; and what is their policy regarding the anonymity of whistleblowing teachers and lecturers.

Lord Nash: We take the issue of witness anonymity extremely seriously.The independent panel overseeing the teacher misconduct case of some of the individuals involved in the events related to Trojan Horse recently ordered the full disclosure of transcripts of interviews given to Peter Clarke. As a result of the independent panel’s direction, lawyers acting on behalf of NCTL wrote to witnesses to inform them of that decision, and stated that in the event that they had any comments or concerns in relation to the disclosure of their transcripts they should contact them. Since the direction, where we have written to witnesses and we have either not yet heard back from them or they have raised concerns, no disclosures have been made. We have informed the independent panel that a number of witnesses have raised concerns, and the panel has indicated that it wishes to consider the issue at a further hearing.These issues are part of a set of complex legal proceedings and it would be inappropriate to comment further at this stage.

Church Schools: Admissions

Lord Murphy of Torfaen: To ask Her Majesty’s Government what assessment they have made of the comparative demand between regions from parents for places in Catholic schools.

Lord Nash: The department makes no assessment of the comparative demand for specific types of school places. Local authorities (LAs) have a statutory responsibility to ensure there are sufficient school places for their areas and they will take parental demand into account when deciding where additional places are needed. Where there is specific demand for additional Catholic school places, it is for the LA to decide how best to meet that demand. This could be through establishing a new school or expanding an existing school.

Schools: Radicalism

Lord Blencathra: To ask Her Majesty’s Government whether it was ministers or civil servants who made the initial decision to reveal the names of the whistleblowers in the investigation into the Trojan Horse case in Birmingham schools; and what was the justification for that decision.

Lord Nash: We take the issue of witness anonymity extremely seriously.The independent panel overseeing the teacher misconduct case of some of the individuals involved in the events related to Trojan Horse recently ordered the full disclosure of transcripts of interviews given to Peter Clarke. As a result of the independent panel’s direction, lawyers acting on behalf of NCTL wrote to witnesses to inform them of that decision, and stated that in the event that they had any comments or concerns in relation to the disclosure of their transcripts they should contact them. Since the direction, where we have written to witnesses and we have either not yet heard back from them or they have raised concerns, no disclosures have been made. We have informed the independent panel that a number of witnesses have raised concerns, and the panel has indicated that it wishes to consider the issue at a further hearing.These issues are part of a set of complex legal proceedings and it would be inappropriate to comment further at this stage.

Schools: Registration

Lord Storey: To ask Her Majesty’s Government how many schools are currently unregistered; and in relation to how many unregistered schools Ofsted carried out investigative work in (1) 2014–15, and (2) 2015–16.

Lord Nash: Children have a fundamental right to be safe both in and out of school. We have made it very clear that it is an offence to operate an unregistered independent school. In January 2016, we announced funding for Ofsted to establish a dedicated team of specialist inspectors to investigate such settings and since that time, there has been a significant escalation of Ofsted investigations.The number of possible cases of unregistered independent schools that may be operating fluctuates all the time, as new settings come to our attention and existing ones are closed down or are confirmed as not operating as schools.Ofsted Annual Report 2015/16: education, early years and skills, published on 1 December 2016, noted that at the time of publication, Ofsted was working on 152 cases of unregistered settings that they suspected may be operating as schools. It also reports that from January 2016 to end August 2016 (the end of the period covered by the report), Ofsted inspected 38 such settings; Ofsted issued 19 warning notices telling proprietors to cease operating illegally; and 15 of those providers ceased to operate illegally following those inspections.A copy of the report is attached.



Ofsted-Annual_Report_on_Eucation_&_skills:2015/16
(PDF Document, 3.29 MB)

Ministry of Defence

Defence: Expenditure

Lord Campbell of Pittenweem: To ask Her Majesty’s Government what recent representations they have made to other members of NATO about the need to reach and maintain the agreed minimum of two per cent per annum of gross domestic product to be spent on defence.

Earl Howe: Government Ministers and officials regularly discuss with NATO Allies the Defence Investment Pledge, which was a key outcome of the NATO summit in Wales in 2014.The United Kingdom already meets this target, will continue to do so for the rest of this decade, and will increase defence spending by 0.5 per cent above inflation every year until 2021.

Cabinet Office

Electoral Register: Students

Lord Rennard: To ask Her Majesty’s Government what is their assessment of the effectiveness of the pilot scheme involving combining the electoral registration process with registration to attend Sheffield University, in terms of the proportion of students included on the electoral register through the scheme, compared to the proportion of students registered to vote at similar-sized universities.

Lord Rennard: To ask Her Majesty’s Government what is their assessment of the advantages or disadvantages to the electoral process of implementing a scheme requiring students, as part of their registration with a college or university, to be given the opportunity to indicate whether or not they would like to be included on the local electoral register, having this information securely transferred to the local authority to check the student’s eligibility to vote and, if eligible, adding the student to the electoral register.

Lord Young of Cookham: The Government part-funded the University of Sheffield pilot, integrating electoral registration with the process of student enrolment, and has encouraged other providers of Higher and Further Education to implement a similar system.An indicative assessment shows this project had successful outcomes. For example, in the 2015/2016 academic year, the university had 76% of eligible students registered to vote compared with figures as low as 13% for similar sized universities. The Government will further evaluate the University of Sheffield pilot to understand – in detail – the impact of the pilot and its critical success factors. We understand a number of institutions have already introduced a similar approach, or are actively considering doing so.At the same time, we believe it is unlikely that any single approach would work in all cases. For example, the Sheffield system would not work in areas like London, or with Further Education colleges, where many students live in a different authority area from their institution, impeding the supply of information between the institution and Electoral Registration Officers. Furthermore, smaller institutions would be less able to absorb the costs associated with implementing such a system, risking the withdrawal of money from the frontline, such as providing the most up-to-date ICT equipment. For these reasons – amongst others – we believe it is right that each institution and local authority is able to choose what works best for them rather than introducing any kind of requirement for institutions to integrate enrolment and registration. Indeed, we are already seeing Higher and Further Education providers working closely with Electoral Service teams to deliver innovative ways to increase the number of students on the electoral register. The Government supports the Electoral Commission and Association of Electoral Administrators who are sharing this good practice.